Paronella park

Yes I know I'm behind on blog posts! We are fine and well in Malaysia at the moment, having stayed in Cairns, Sydney and Singapore. I will try to get up to date in the next few days...

But first - Paronella Park!

We pulled in to this car park, as I had seen the place on some brochure and wanted to see what it was about. From the carpark we could see the tip of castle ruins. The price was too expensive though, AU$28 each. We were trying to operate on a budget of about $30 per day, so this was well off.

Just as we were pulling out, a guy who we now know is the proprietor (Mark, I think) wandered up eating an icecream, tapped on the window and started chatting to us. We explained that it seemed interesting but was too expensive, moved on to the fact we were Kiwis etc. and this guy just kept rambling on. Finally he offers us a 'special deal' if we want to stay in a camper site as well as seeing the park.

We wanted hot showers (which it had) and so we were planning on spending $20 on a camper park anyway, and the deal was pretty good, though I can't remember exactly how much. This guy can just keep talking - Norty if you're reading, he'd keep you honest :P

So we park up and prepare ourselves for a night walk through the park. We know nothing other then the fact that it is Spanish style castles/buildings. Mark was the man taking us on our spotlight tour.

Now this is a really interesting place, but Mark talks it up so much that I could hardly stop from laughing out loud. This guy is SO passionate about this place. The executive summary (See full blurb here) is that a guy named Jose Paronella came over from Spain in 1913 and started out cutting sugarcane, then moved into developing sugarcane fields and selling them, making himself quite a handsome profit.

He then purchased a lovely section of land next to a beautiful waterfall and started building all the structures that are there today - A ballroom, fountains, staircases etc. The amount of effort is quite impressive no doubt. A series of misfortunate events meant that the park was closed and not repaired, and eventually abandoned. It fell out of memory until the early 90s when Mark and his partner bought the land, and started stripping back the rainforest that had grown around only to find all these interesting features!

Mark speaks with such devotion about every little feature, his passion and enthusiasm is what entertained me! His excitement about cutting thru the jungle that had enveloped the park, the heartbreak of the cyclones and floods that have damaged it. He kept reminding us all to tell our friends and families about this exciting place. Tell everyone!!



I laughed so hard when I saw this sign - The message is consistent - let everyone know about us! Films have been made here, did you know - Sniper Starring: Tom Berenger and Billy Zane! There were a few others that I hadn't heard of, and actually I only know the actors, not Sniper itself. This guy is practically foaming at the mouth with excitement for the park!

I hope this doesn't sound derogatory - Mark is a genuine honest good bloke, and is obviously full of heart. I just felt like I was watching a late night infomercial for Paronella parks while he talked - his is excitement is only matched by his ability to talk. Lots. Consistently. He is overflowing with genuine passion (Which, to be fair, sets him apart from the infomercials). But still, a really interesting place, and I would recommend it to anyone interested in novel architecture. Or crazy Aussies...

Mark if you read this, feel free to chip in in the comments section :)



The park is has all been planned around the waterfall, it was obviously an important part of the planning. The water fountain shown above is actually gravity powered from the waterfall itself! Most of the park lies below the waterfall, so Jose simply took a feed off the top of the waterfall, and piped it into this feature, next to the tennis court and refreshment building...



I haven't quite got my finger on what the parks purpose was, but I think it was not a commercial venture, I think Jose wanted a leisure park where he could host events and socialise - very noble! It has swimming areas, fishing holes, lovers caves and walks, a ballroom and movie rooms, as well as the tennis court and lots of open spaces for picnics or other outdoor entertaining.



And in addition to the fountain, Jose actually set up one of the first running hydro-electric stations in Australia. This powered all the lighting etc around the park. It is not going, but plans are underway to restore it, one of the few bits of the park to get fixed. Mark is trying to preserve the park, not restore it, as he pointed out plenty.

"Its definitely going to be finished by October. Well ... we might be a little late but definitely by the end of the year... and if not we'll get it going next year some time..."

We went down into the hydro room...



..And boy the stairs are steep to get there! We were both clutching the handrails like crazy. The structure has handled 60 odd years of mother nature and is still standing, so we figured that although it looked a bit hokey, and was probably built before stafety standards applied, we'd be OK.




Jose planted heaps of plants, including what is known as Kauri Avenue. These trees line the walkway, and the avenue actually looks down to the waterfall - very pretty.



The grand staircase goes up from the waterside to the ballroom..



and looking down from the grand staircase. the whole park is made of cast concrete (I assume with reinforcements) with lots of small rocks and shells in the mix. Add to that the weathering over the years and moss, and the place has an odd beauty. The lush rainforest helps too.



This is part of the ballroom, which has also suffered damage thru the years, but still looks magnificent. All of this park has been built primarily by Jose himself, though he must have got help with some of the grunt work as the scale is too large for one man. He probably called in lots of favors from mates...




We were promised that the park would be the most amazing thing we'd ever see in Australia, and although I'm not sure if that claim is really legitimate, it was well worth seeing - there is plenty more features that I haven't pictured, and the park is really very pretty. I would recommend anyone who has some time in north Queensland to have a look, and not just for the crazy tour guide :)

Brisbane to Cairns

So - as you have all noticed, we have not posted for ages.

Here is the quick list of where we travelled in the van:

22nd June	Picked up van and drove to Surfers Paradise. Stayed at Caravan Park.
3rd	Visited Dreamworld, stayed at Caravan park
24th	Visited Whitewater World, drove north and stayed at Beerwah/Glass House Mountains 20hr stop.
25th	Visited Australia Zoo, stayed near Noosa Head somewhere on side of the road.
26th	Drove thru Gympie looking for Laundromat. Stayed just south of Bundaberg at 20 hr stop.
27th	Stay at 1770 campsite.
28th	Found an iCafe at Rockhampton. Stayed at some 20hr stop between Rockhampton and Mackay.
29th , 30th	Stayed at Caravan Park at Whitsundays / Airlie Beach.
1st July	Stopped at Dingo beach. Stayed at Bluewater just north of Townsville.
2nd	stayed at Wallaman Falls.
3rd	Visited the Murray Falls. Stayed at Paronella Park.
4th	stayed at Innot Hot Springs.
5th	stayed at Babinda Boulders.
6th	arrived in Cairns.

I’m sorry that there haven’t been any posts recently, it has been hard to find iCafes along the way between Brisbane and Cairns. The few places that did have them were quite expensive - $5+ per hour.

So here I am in Cairns having to remember what we have been doing. My last post stopped at Australia Zoo, and so I’ll attempt a whirlwind tour of what we have did.

We got to the Zoo about 8pm, and I pulled in to the carpark to see if staying the evening in the van there would be a go-er. As soon as I pulled in, a security ute tailed us, so I stopped (against Princesses protests) and waited for the guard to come and talk to us. He did, of course, and explained that we couldn’t stay here, but there was a place just up the road that we could stay.

Turns out that Australia these sweet rest stops, much like NZ, that you are allowed to stay overnight in (the sign says up to 20 hours). They usually have (long drop) toilets and shelter to eat in. Basic but free – found my brand!

We drove up to Noosa heads and looked around – very much like the Gold Coast, a beach and lots of high rises and malls. Eew!. I was planning on popping in on an old family friend, but I didn't realise that they were so close too Noosa, so by the time I realised we were close, I had only the afternoon free - and they weren't home. Sorry Karen and Pete..

The weather was bad, so we were trying to put some kilometers on the clock so we could relax when we got better weather.

We drove thru a treat of a town called Gympie - this is a classic hick town. They had the red box warehouse that looked like the one in Lower Hutt did back in the early 90's - a $2 shop looks more glamorous! The only thing going for Gympie was the sweet smell of coffee and chocolate from the Nestle factory...

We drove thru and headed to Bundaberg. We knew it for the ginger beer, and everyone there was surprised! They thought they were famous for their rum. I expect that Bundaberg Rum is available in NZ, but as neither of us are rum drinkers, well we didn't know.

One of the surprised Bundaberg-ians was an amusing old boy called Arthur A, who worked at the infodesk in Bundaberg. Hes is an ex-pom who had lived in Wellington and told us a great story about how the english lads showed the kiwi blokes up back in the 60s because they knew how to look after the girls - the kiwis were all drinking beer and not paying attention. Arthur and his mates were carrying drinks for the ladies and entertaining them in their band - Can't remember the name, but they met at some soccer club and drank and played. Very amusing!




We went to the ginger beer factory, but didn't go in because we didn't want to spring $ for the tour. Still, we have been to Bundaberg.

Having seen the site in Bundaberg (yeah there isn't much else to see there unless you like Rum) we headed out to a beach site called 1770. The Aussies aren't very inventive with their naming - this is the site that Captain Cook landed in.. you guessed it .. 1770. A kiwi couple we met on the Gold Coast suggested it as a beautiful place, and it really is. As we were driving in I swear I thought we were in Summer Bay! I don't watch Home and Away, honest...







This is us up on the cape at the end of 1770, with Princess pointing towards our home, Aotearoa. We miss you NZ! Check out the extra we found in our sealed salad pack from Coles supermarket:



Yep, thats a fly! Thankfully we spotted it before opening, and Coles did swap it no questions. Still, eeeeew! As part of our super-cheap-meals-because-we-are-on-a-budget, we ate lots of salad buns. I wonder how many had unknown flys in them?

We drove on north thru Rockhampton and Mackay with nothing exciting to report. It was somewhere around here we started noticing sugar cane plantations and coal trains - lots of both! Australia has mineral wealth, whereas NZ has, um, sheep?

We stopped at Airlie beach next to the Whitsundays, a group of islands that mark the southern end of the Great Barrier Reef. Airlie beach itself isn't much of a beach, its really just pubs, resorts and stack of shops for purchasing cruises. Though we didn't actually go out to the islands, the water and beaches around the area are simply gorgeous! Dingo beach was our pick around there, and it looked just like the pamphlets of the beaches on the islands. Mmmmm.... we spent all day reading in the sun!

At the campsite I helped these 2 Dutch guys fix the exhaust of their ghetto old suzuki baby-van.


Their exhaust had cracked around most of the circumference - the only thing stopping it from falling off completely was the fact that the crack spiraled down the length slightly, meaning the crack was helix shaped.



I suggested getting it welded, but they wanted the quick n dirty fix, so we wrapped it with epoxy exhaust tape and then got a bit of tin can, wrapped it around like a splint, then tightened it all with hoseclips.



Would it hold? I wasn't sure, but if I interpret their blog correctly, its still in place and going well!

After a day of relaxing on the beaches, we Headed north again, and we were both struck by the geology of Australia - it is such a flat county. Hills protrude from the earth very sharply, and so the perimeter of any hill is very clearly defined. They really are rocks sticking out of the sand! We saw this one that was so prominent, I decided to take the van up and have a look...



This was a very steep road - first gear for lots of it. Mt Inkerman has a very small footprint, a perimeter of maybe a kilometer or 2, but the surrounding land was so flat that it sticks out like, um, a big stikky-outty thing!



Yep it was something like a 20% grade in parts. Yep, that means for every 10 meters forward, you go 2 meters up!



The views from the top were awesome though, you could see forever in any direction.

We were both surprised by Townsville, this city was obviously more affluent and metropolitan then any of the other towns we had been through since Brisbane. I think it was a mix of the coal wealth, sugar refineries and the navy/army bases that were nearby. Whatever the reason, it was a refreshing and pretty city.

From Townsville we decided to head inland and see some of the sights off the coast a bit. The Atherton Tablelands is an area that is raised higher than most of Aus, and has hills and farmlands that look at bit like home, in addition to the tropical rainforests, which do not!




We stayed a night in the forest next to these falls, which are just amazing - that is a bloody big fall!



The road out there was windy and changed from tarmac to mud/gravel at least a half dozen times..very odd. Aus has some shocking roading off the main roads, (as does NZ) but even the Bruce highway, the main one from Brisbane to Cairns, was really bad, especially the northern end. At 110kph we were playing dodge the potholes - and they were numerous. And only the Aussies would call a highway Bruce!

Driving thru the tablelands we chanced upon a place called Paronella Park. This adventure will be getting a whole blog post on its own, but I'll put this pic up as a teaser of whats to come!



We stayed our second to last night at the innot hotsprings, as princess wanted to bathe in warm water. This is a natural hotspring that bubbles up and spits out into the creek. There are a couple of caravan parks and motels that use the water and have their own heated pools from the springs.

Unfortunately, Princess' skin didn't like the water so it was only me that ended up getting any soaking done!



Our final night was spent at the Babinda boulders, and awesome natural valley - it was so good, we since re-visited with Princess' family from Cairns. We'll write more in the following posts on the boulders.

We then drove into Cairns, dropped off the van, and carried our stuff to the motel and sat outside waiting for the rest of the family to arrive...

Cruisin...

Hello all!

We picked up our van from Wicked Campers and started our journey from Brisbane to Cairns. But before that, we took a detour south to the gold coast to see the theme parks.



This is us parked up at the gold coast - our van is called Murdock as it has a big pic of the lead singer from Gorillaz, Murdoch (aka Damon Albarn from Blur). You can't see it as the door is open, but I'll get a pic sometime soon.

I had hoped to be able to choose our van, as there were heaps of options (including a Beatles one, which Princess wanted) but we were issued this. On the plus side, it was an upgrade to power steering and A/C as the one pencilled for us hadn't arrived.

We have seen heaps of these campers, and every one has a unique paint job. Saw one painted up in yellow with the DHL logo, and "Days and Hours Late" underneath it.. funny. Also seen Scoobys mystery machine, Sex pistols, Family Guy, Simpsons, the Goonies... you get the idea.

So on day one, we went to Dreamworld and looked around. I went on all the rides, but Princess didn't want to ride the scary ones. The only one that was truly scary was the Giant Drop




First off, I'm not great with heights. Second, this is easily double the height of the one at Rainbows End. Third, although fast acceleration is exilerating, being accelerated downwards is a whole different thing! I was scared for most of the ride upwards slowly, and downright petrified on the 3 seconds of freefall downwards.... urg!

To make things worse, that night we hear that some poor girl in the US got her feet ripped off at the ankle on a very similar ride, with the boss of Dreamworld going on TV assuring everyone that their ride was OK...

All the other thrill rides were fun. On top of the thrill rides there were lots of other things to do.



They had a Tiger show, and we got to get up close (but not touch) the baby tiger cubs... Sooooo cute! we saw a few iMax movies, and ate lots of (expensive) candy.. was really cool.



We won some tickets at the arcade park, so I got a tattoo for my mum - Love you mom! Don't worry its just a sticker...

Went to WhiteWaterWorld next door the next day, but it was a bit cold to really enjoy, so after trying out all the rides, we went back to DreamWorld. Princess will tell you all about the water park rides sometime anyway.

After our fun at the gold coast, we headed north to go to Australia Zoo (CRIKEY!). Aus has these rest stops that you are allowed to stay for up to 20 hours, so we found one close to the zoo and parked up for the night. Early morning, we went around to the zoo...




I tried to be a ninja like Steveo but due to the crap camera, we couldn'
t get a good action shot.




Australia zoo is very nice, big enclosures and quite natural feeling. And yes, that snake is huuuuuge! Bindi and Terri were not there, I saw them on the news (we have a tiny B/W TV that plugs into the cig lighter) that night opening some kind of whale watching endeavour in Noosa. Boy the merchandise machine is in full swing at their shop though, Crikey this, and Bindi that - I can see why some think she is being exploited. Perhaps its OK because the cash goes towards saving the crocs etc. (Crocs Reuule!)



This baby is expected to grow to 12 feet!



The Crocoseum is where they do a croc show to 5000 people (but not on a tuesday in midwinter - more like 1000). Was kinda cool, but i wish Irwin was there doing it! There was a huge memorial under this with all the letters, gifts etc sent in memory of Steve - touched lots of peoples lives ... and a few bung-holes according to south park :)



Australia zoo also had a tiger show, but theirs was better, we got to see them jumping and swimming! Very cool. The tigers didnn't like getting into the pool because their front paws are so sensitive. once their paws are wet, they jump in no problem. And don't worry, the water is heated to 28C...warm!

They didn't have all sorts of animals, mainly just Australian ones which was nice. No polar bears sweating etc. The exceptions were the Tigers (for conservation) and some Elephants. Everything else was Crocs, 'roos, birds, snakes from Aus.

Times running out, so I'll chat later. Love you all. T.

Brrrrrrisbane

So, as Princess detailed, we spent a couple of days in Auckland hanging out with her family there. Chris (Princess' Dad) had his fuel pump die and the ADSL stop going in one day - it seemed like I brought trouble with me... I didn't mean to Chris!

I think I might have brought that cold weather up from Welly, and over to Brisbane too... though I see on stuff that Otago is snowed under!





Or first day in Brisbane was cold! We spent the morning wandering around the central city looking at the shops (And being silly with the local artwork..). Its no surprise that all malls look the same, but we were both surprised at how many shops in NZ are actually Aus shops! Brumbys, cash converters, woolworths, DSE, Ma Higgins, Hogsbreath cafe.. there are heaps more, but I can't think of them ATM.

I expected it to warm up, but my lunchtime it was obvious that it wasn't going to, so we went down to a bargain clothes shop and got princess a $30 jacket.... mm much warmer. Everyone said that that the river banks were beautiful, so I suggested we hire a tandem (super tourist-y) and so we cycled a figure of 8 over the 3 big bridges and along the banks.. very nice!



Stopped our tandem down South Bank and had a look at this Tibetan (hand carved) wooden building made for the '88 expo in Brisbane. It was beautifully intricate -the pics dont do it justice.



Saw the (mechano) Storey bridge up close - very pretty, but don't look down! I can't do heights very well, and it wasn't till I suggested we stop for a picture that I realised how high that bridge is! It has a huge runup on the 'kangaroo point' side, because the other side of the river is has a cliff with the connecting road on top, so the bridge has to be quite high.

I think the EnergyIntellect office was on Kangaroo Point - not sure? Couldn't find it anyway..




After a hard days excercise (11 km ton the bike the brochure said) We went back to the YHA and just blobbed in front of the TV for a while before crashing out for the night.

Next day, we got up early and headed out to Lone Pines Koala Sanctuary. I'll let a picture speak first..



We walked around looking at a whole range of fluro colored birds, then listened to the story of koalas - how their numbers are dwindling due to predators, urbanisation and bushfires etc. Very sad. They are very picky about what gumtree varieties they eat, and their bums have unique white markings which is apparently so that when viewed from below, it looks like sun thru the trees...



Of course princess wanted to cuddle them, but they were gouging more cash for an actual hold, so we instead just went and patted them. very soft. Very cute. Very relaxed. Contrary to popular belief, they dont get stoned from gumleaves, its just that there is bugger all energy in gum leaves so they have to sleep 20 hours a day, and so are generally chill/asleep animals.





The koalas are soooooo cute! You can see the mums and their young in the pic above.



There were heaps of cute animals, if you click on one of the pics, you can go to all our pics, including the aforementioned fluro birds etc.. We werre surprised at how calm and gentle the 'roos were too - you culd just walk up and feed them! I guess they get used to it after the first hundred busloads of Japanese tourists...

Afterwards, we took the bus back to the YHA and had an afternoon nap - we aren't used to all this exercise! The next day (now for me) we checked out of the YHA and we are about to pick up our wicked campervan... wooo roadtrip! Its a diesel, and will be covered in graffiti. Pics will come. Not sure if Princess can drive it as shes still on her NZ restricted... I think she wants to do the final test up in Kaitaia where there is like 1 set of traffic lights and 1 roundabout... rush hour is when 2 cars go the same way down a street...

Love you all, Toolman

Auckland and onward..

Hi everyone!

Well it has been rather awhile since I last posted an entry, so here I am again! I have been given the task of covering the Auckland leg of our trip, so here goes...

We left Napier at 1.00pm on Saturday afternoon. It was very surreal saying goodbye to my mum, I can't believe I'm not going to see her for at least two years! After lots of hugs and photos (mum even snuck onto the bus to take some!) we were on our way. The bus ride to Taupo was great as it was snowing! There is a certain magical quality about the snow which I just love, I am always excited to see it.

We also had the great pleasure of being driven to Taupo by a gorgeous Maori man named Hone. He was SUCH a character and the epitome (sp?) of Kiwi. He gave us an interesting commentary of the local surroundings which was neat. He also made a point of reminding us to take all our belongings with us when we left the bus as he has many nephews and nieces' who would appreciate some free stuff! It was so funny.

Approx 5 hours later we arrived in Auckland. Dad came and collected us. Had a nice night catching up with Dad, his partner Gill and her daughter/my stepsister Lauren.

The next day we had a goodbye lunch with some family friends and some friends of mine. It was really nice to see everybody and get a chance to say goodbye as it might be a while before we see them again. I was very spoilt and received lots of lovely presents. Thanks guys!

This is me and my (huge) brother! He left on a 12 day mission with some of his mates to Japan the day before us.

On Monday we went and spent the day in Queen Street. It was nice to have a wander around my old stomping ground and check out what had changed. Tim's father and stepmother were heading off on a cruise from Princes Wharf in the afternoon, so we met up with them for a coffee.

(Toolman here: The obligatory pose with me and Dad - He won the cruise as a prize for selling the most in a 6 month period. If you are in Tauranga and need a home, go see Nice Paul!)

On Monday night one of my oldest and dearest friends came over for a visit which was lovely. She spent 3 months of last year over in the US, so she had lots of interesting photos to show us.

And then it was Tuesday. Departure day. It was such a strange day, I wasn't quite sure how to feel. It was all a little overwhelming to be honest. I couldn't let myself think about leaving NZ, suddenly I felt VERY patriotic. I love my little country! I bought myself a NZ t-shirt at the airport which I intend to wear very proudly.

We boarded our flight destined for Brisbane at 2.35pm. Goodbye NZ! We sat next to a lovely German guy called Christian (TT: Cwistian... he had that funny German liwsp) who we spent most of the flight chatting to. He told us tales of his adventures around NZ and Australia, and gave us some suggestions of where we should visit.

We arrived at Brisbane airport around 5.00pm. The first thing I noticed was how dark it was - it seemed like it was the middle of the night. We didn't get up to much last night, just had a quick wander round near our hostel to find some kai.

Brisbane is cold! We have spent today wandering around the CBD of the city and there is a very nasty wellingtonesque wind around. Neither of us have bought a great deal of warm clothing with us so we are freezing, hence the visit to an internet cafe! It's far too cold to be outside. Apart from the cold Brisbane is a pretty city with lots of lovely old architecture. I am very tempted by the masses of shops, but have to be strong as I am on a very strict budget! I think I may crack a little and buy a warm jacket though.....

Anyways darlings I am going to finish this now and try and convince Tim that it is time to have lunch. It's only 11.30am, but we've been up for hours as our stupid body clocks are out of whack.

Take care everyone!

xxxxxxxxxx